


Sherlock's Spouse(s)

by lalunaunita



Series: Weekly Sherlock Prompts [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, sherlock weekly prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-06
Updated: 2019-01-06
Packaged: 2019-10-05 12:44:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17325233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lalunaunita/pseuds/lalunaunita
Summary: The prompt for 1/4/19: Write about the immediate aftermath of Sherlock’s death. It doesn’t have to follow the canon that the show set.John fields several visitors the day after Sherlock dies, all of them claiming to be married to Sherlock. He doesn't like it a bit.





	Sherlock's Spouse(s)

John yanked open the door to the flat at 221B Baker Street and stared down at a small woman in a slouchy brown knitted hat, golden curls framing her face, damp handkerchief pressed to her eyes.

“Yes?” he asked, one eyebrow quirked.

“I-I’m Shirley B-Benson-Holmes. I’m Sherlock’s wife,” the woman sobbed, clutching the edges of her cardigan to her.

“Estranged, lost, or secret?” John replied.

The woman’s red eyes opened wide. “Wh-w-”

“Nevermind,” sighed John. “Queue up, please. And wipe your feet on the mat.”

He pulled the door wide and the woman stepped in. A line of women and a few men skirted the edges of the small sitting room.

John checked his watch and cleared his throat. “It’s time for the hourly announcement. Ladies (and gentlemen), Sherlock Holmes had some notoriety, it is true, but this did not translate into wealth. If you are here on the assumption that you will claim some part of an estate, you are wasting your time. Otherwise, you may stay in the line until Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock’s brother and a _government official_ , evaluates the veracity of your status as Sherlock’s lawfully wedded spouse.”

John ground out the last sentence as though he’d memorized it, and he had. Mycroft had grilled him on the wording, as though John hadn’t learned a thousand complicated Latin terms in med school.

It was effective. Six women and one man shuffled their feet, checked their watches, put on hats, and murmured something about appointment times, or friends waiting for them, or ovens left on, and cleared out of the flat. John smiled grimly. Sometimes it took two or three repetitions, but in the end, everyone eventually chose to leave.

The latest visitor, Mrs. Benson-Holmes, moved as though to sit on the couch.

“Don’t,” John shrilled, holding up a hand.

She froze in place, then straightened.

“You’re not a guest. You’re a charlatan keeping me from processing my grief in a healthy way on the day after my best friend has died,” John declared.

As the faker in front of him dissolved into fresh tears, John whirled, crossing his arms over his chest and pressing one hand to his brow. He took two steps and entered the kitchen. The queue terminated at the kitchen table. Mycroft sat at one end, holding court over a makeshift interrogation room. A mousy woman nervously clutching a purse sat across from him. _At least this one isn’t faking tears_ , John thought.

Mycroft glanced up at John as he passed through, a grimace that doubled as a smile on his dour face. It was good of Mycroft to entertain the string of idiots, John thought, though he supposed there was a practical aspect. If anyone had a legitimate claim as Sherlock’s bride or groom, best to get it settled right away. Mycroft was certainly one for business first, sentimentality later - if at all. Spending an entire day fielding fraudulent claims about his brother’s marital status was likely to be as sentimental as he would get.

John stood at the open door of Sherlock’s bedroom and knocked. Molly Hooper looked up from a chair in the corner and gave him a tearful smile.

“How are you holding up?” John asked kindly.

He came close and sat on the edge of the bed.

Molly sighed and waved a hand to indicate the living room past the kitchen. “This is all so ridiculous. And hurtful. It’s hurtful.”

“Yes. I suppose it is what it is.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know. Just what people say sometimes.”

A smile tugged at Molly’s lips. “You can be really silly, John. You essentially created Sherlock, you know. No one would be visiting the flat today if it weren’t for you. All these women enamored of ‘Local Celebrity, Sherlock Holmes’. Now you’re reduced to a few meaningless phrases.”

“What are you trying to say? Sherlock was my muse?”

“Ha! Maybe.”

Molly scrunched something in her hand. John eyed her curiously.

“What are you doing back here, anyway?”

“Oh, you mean besides hiding from the faux wives club?”

Molly had come by early in the morning to exchange sympathies and take tea. She and John had been utterly stunned by the first knock at 9:00 am sharp. New claimants followed every 15 or 20 minutes as the news stations ran their main headline over and over throughout the day: “Local Consulting Detective Sherlock Holmes Dead in Apparent Suicide”. Unable to watch as woman after woman paraded into the apartment, Molly had ducked back into Sherlock’s room as John called Mycroft to figure out a solution.

Now she held up her left hand, giggling. John’s eyes widened. A tiny circle of tin foil fashioned into a ring with a bulb on top glinted on her ring finger.

“Sherlock proposed to me with this ring. I’m going to join the queue. I mean, we were _only_ engaged, but our love was true, and in my heart, we were already married. Do you want one?”

“You’re insane. And yes.” John replied, an open-mouthed grin stretching across his features. Molly bounced onto the bed, settling her knees beneath her as she reached for a roll of aluminum foil John hadn’t even noticed. She ripped off a fresh strip and formed a ring for him, twisting and crinkling it into a circle with a bulb on top similar to her own.

“We used to do this when we were girls and tell each other all the celebrities that had come to town to propose to us,” she murmured as she worked.

John just shook his head.

A few minutes later, the two of them burst into the kitchen, giggling madly.

“Mycroft, throw these people out!” Molly shouted, waving her left hand with a flourish.

The tin foil twinkled under the kitchen lamp. John threw his hand forward as well.

“What in the Queen’s name are you doing?” Mycroft asked, sitting straight and proper at the table.

“We’re joining the queue,” John replied, in the most serious tone he could muster. It wasn’t very serious.

“You’ve gone ‘round the bend, the pair of you,” Mycroft muttered, turning back to the woman at the table.

Molly laughed, a little too loud. John joined her, grabbing her shoulders and pulling her into a hug. They laughed together, harder and harder until John felt Molly drop. His own knees gave way and they sank down to the kitchen floor still holding tight and laughing until their sides hurt. It wasn’t until he felt dampness on his shirt collar that John realized the laughter had become tears.


End file.
